Through Violet Eyes
by IMironicANDyoureNOT
Summary: Gilbert is an Agent for the American FBI, Lost in his past. Matthew is a tool used by the government, lost in his fears. Can the two find comfort in each other, even with a murderer hungry for Matthew's blood on the loose? PruCan
1. Chapter 1 The Faceless Man

** I DO NOT OWN. **

**1 : The Faceless Man : 1**

Crouching behind the wooden toolshed along the back fence, the man watched the little blonde boy play in the yard. Perspiration blotched the featureless weave of the black veil that obscured his face, and sweat oozed under the latex of his gloves as he flexed his fingers.

It hadn't rained in Los Angeles for almost six months and the haze of accumulated smog cast an amber pall over the pink bungalow house and it's tiny backyard. The late September heat wave had dried the grass to brittle yellow needles, and patches of bare dirt mottled the lawn like mange. An inflatable wading pool decorated with Winnie-the-pooh characters sagged in the center of the yard, and the boy squatted in its shallow water, wearing a pair of blue swim shorts. His wet hair dripped down onto his freckled face as he made his plastic toy boat swim in big circles around him.  
The man's breath quickened, the air hot and stifling underneath his mask of crepe. The child's older brother was at work and the babysitter had gone into the the house more than twenty minutes ago. It was the first time in three days that the man had seen the boy left unattended. Nevertheless he hesitated.  
Then he saw him begin to twitch.  
He dropped the boat in the water and clapped his hands over his ears. "Somebody's knocking! Somebody's knocking!"  
The man tensed and mouthed words under his breath. He imagined that he could her the soundless whispers sifting into the boy's skull.  
/They/ had found him.  
The boy stumbled out of the pool, still clutching his temples, jerking his head as if in the throws of a seizure. "Somebody's knocking! Somebody's knocking!"  
The man shot a wary glance toward the back door of the house and lunged toward him.  
Seeing him, the boy yelped and broke into a zigzagging run toward the house. He blocked him, but he dodged his grasping hands and doubled back on him, scrambling toward the backyard gate. When he cut him off, he scampered to the chain-link fence that bordered the neighbors' yard, Locked his fingers on its wire mesh, and shook it, screaming.  
As he took hold of his shoulders, though, a sudden exhaustion seemed to overwhelm him, and he drooped against the fence. His face pinched with concentration, he whispered the letters of the alphabet like a rosary. "A-B-C-D-E-F-G... H-I-J-K-L-M-N-O-P... Q-R-S-T-U-V..."  
His voice trailed off. The contours of his face subtly changed, his expression darkening.  
Strength surged back into his small frame, and he whipped around, snarling, and clawed the fabric of his mask, trying to pull it from his face. Anticipating that he would do this, the man caught hold of his arms and forced them down.  
"Who are you?" The boy's voice resonates with adult authority. "Why are you doing this to us?" He glared at him with gleaming violet eyes.  
The smooth, shallow hollows of his masked face betrayed no emotion, but the man trembled visibly. Holding the struggling child at arm's length, he clasped his head with rubber-skinned hands in an almost tender caress.  
And then, with a single break twist, he snapped his neck.

**review like hell peeps I want some feedback. **


	2. Chapter 2 Summoning A Witness

**Two chaps in one day, guys, I know I rock. So, the trial in this chap doesn't hold very much importance to the story besides showing you what kind of a horribly stressful day Canada has because he does this like... A lot of times in one day. Basically his life sucks, and that's the point of the chap.**

** 2 : Summoning A Witness : 2**

Traffic clotted the Hollywood freeway that morning, and Gilbert missed the start of the Munõz murder trial. By the time he arrived at the Criminal Justice Center, the persecution was already preparing to summon the victim to testify.  
Since he was running late, he decided to park in one of the privately owned downtown lots rather than search for the law-enforcement garage. The Bureau could eat the fourteen dollar charge. He regretted the choice before he'd walked even half a block, though, for he could feel sweat dampen the dress shirt beneath his blazer.  
Despite the oppressive heat, spectators and television news crews clustered around the courthouse entrance, the crowd held at bay by a cordon of uniformed guards from the Sheriff's Office. A Violet was due to take the stand today, an event so rare that it made headlines. Usually, the mere threat of a Violet's testimony served to force a plea bargain, yet Hector Munõz had insisted upon his not-guilty plea and demanded his day in court.  
Gilbert nudged his way through the crowd to the roped-off area surrounding the entrance and flashed his ID at the beige-shirted officer standing there, who waved him toward the door.  
Relieved to be in the building's cool foyer, Gilbert showed the Bureau badge again at the lobby's security checkpoint. "Okay Agent...Beilschmidt." The white-shirted guard, a beefy Hispanic man, read the ID and handed it back. "If you like, I can keep your gun for you until you pass through the detector..."  
Gilbert gave him a tight-lipped smile. "No need. I'm not carrying." He emptied his pockets into a wooden box and strolled through the door-shaped booth without setting off the alarm.  
The guard grinned. "In that case, have a wonderful day!"  
Gilbert touched two fingers to his forehead in a Boy Scout salute and and collected his loose change and car keys.  
A placard beside the elevators warned him that "All Persons Will Be Searched On 9th Floor," and he discovered that even his Bureau badge couldn't save him from further delay. Gilbert didn't mind, however. Violets creeped him out, and he would be spending enough time with this particular Violet in the days to come. No need to rush it.  
Superior court 9-101 exhaled a cold, air-conditioned draft as Gilbert eased open one of its double doors and stepped inside. The room was nearly filled to capacity, but Gilbert located a seat at the back of the gallery while the judge finished her mandatory admonition to the jury.  
"The statement of the victim should be considered as carefully, and with as much skepticism, as that of any other witness when you decide upon your verdict." The matronly black justice peered at the jurors over the tops of her spectacles, her furrowed face stern. "You must weigh the testimony of the deceased against the other evidence presented by both the prosecution an the defense in order to determine the truth for yourselves. Do you understand your responsibilities as I have described them to you?"  
The jurors mumbled their assent, although several of them seemed apprehensive. Compulsively drumming his fingers on the defense table, Hector Munõz shifted in his chair and leaned over to whisper something to his attorney. She merely shook her head, a drawn look on her face.  
"Very well." The judge nodded to the assistant D.A., a tall, studious man with flawlessly combed black hair. Mr. Jacobs, you may call your next witness."  
"Thank you, Your Honor." Jacob rose from his chair. "Bailiff, would you show in Mr. Williams."  
A stocky man in uniform opened a door to the left of the judge's bench and ushered a gaunt, pale young man with a shaved head into the room. Gilbert craned his neck for a better view of the Violet he'd be living with for the next few weeks.  
He wore a long sleeved shirt and slacks that both seemed a size too large for him, making him appear frail in the antiseptic illumination of the courtroom's fluorescent lighting. Nevertheless, he spoke with a quiet, understated strength as the Bailiff swore him in.  
A high-backed reclining chair had been places on the witness stand for his testimony. Heavy nylon straps dangled from the chair's back and legs. "Please state your name for the record." Jacobs instructed the man once he'd seated himself.  
"Matthew Williams."  
"And you are a licensed member of the North American Afterlife Communication Corps?"  
"That's correct."  
"And do you intend to serve the court today with complete honesty and to the best of your abilities?"  
"I do."  
Jacobs turned to a portly, bespectacled man who stood to the right of the witness stand. "Mr. Burton, would you prepare the conduit for testimony?"  
Pulling a penlight from the inside pocket of his suit coat, Burton shone the light in both of Williams' eyes to make sure he wasn't wearing colored contact lenses. Although there were now more sophisticated ways of verifying the authenticity of a "conduit", this method had become traditional, for, as their nickname implied, all Violets were born with violet irises. Burton wheeled a pushcart bearing a SoulScan unit up to the witness stand and connected Williams to the device by attaching a series of electrodes to his bare head with surgical tape. Like most Violets, he had the twenty contact points tattooed on his scalp as a constellation of tiny bluish spots.  
Jacobs explained to the jury how this sophisticated electroencephalograph could detect the electromagnetic presence of the victim's soul as it suffused the conduit's brain. "You'll be able to see for yourselves the precise moment of inhabitation," he said, indicating a large, greenish monitor mounted on the wall above Williams' chair. Gilbert noted that Jacobs failed to mention the function of the large red button on the SoulScan console. Known as the "Panic Button," it would send a powerful electric shock through the wires to the Violet's head and forcibly eject a soul that became violent or refused to leave the conduit's body. Through rigorous mental discipline, trained Violets could usually evict an unruly soul at any time, but the Panic Button was there as a safeguard, for the dead were always unpredictable.  
Burton stepped away from the witness stand, leaving Williams with a forest of wires sprouting from his brow. These wires twisted into a rope-like bundle that snaked down to a port on the SoulScan unit. Burton flicked on the machine, and a series of green lines appeared on the monitor. The rhythmic little zigzags of the top three lines represented the alpha waves of Matthew's conscious thought. The bottom three lines lay flat, awaiting the inhabiting entity.  
"Are you ready, Mr. Williams?" Jacobs asked.  
"Yes." He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, while Burton fastened the nylon straps around his legs and torso and bound his wrists together with a ratcheted plastic band.  
'It's for his own safety.' Gilbert reminded himself, but the thought failed to reassure him. Painful as the restraints were, Williams would soon suffer worse.  
Jacobs unsealed one of the prosecution's clear plastic evidence bags and pulled out a baby's bib printed with teddy bears. He displayed it to the jury, then placed the bib in Williams' hands.  
Gilbert grimaced an shook his head. This D.A. pulled no punches. He could have selected almost any item touched or worn by the victim to serve as the touchstone. A hairbrush, a house key, a driver's license- all of these items would retain a faint quantum link to the dead woman and would draw her electromagnetic essence to the conduit like a lightning rod. Instead, Jacobs had chosen to use her child's clothing for the most emotional impact it would have on the jurors. Why Munõz would want to put himself through the torture of a Violet's testimony, Gilbert couldn't comprehend. To look into those eyes and see the life you took staring back at you...  
Williams shaped silent words with his lips and the alpha waves that scrolled across the top of the SoulScan monitor became more measured and even. Soon, he would withdraw into his own subconscious and cede control of his body.  
Jacobs glanced over his shoulder at the crowd in the gallery. "Please remain quiet," he admonished them. He needn't have bothered. The silence made it seem as though everyone in the room had stopped breathing.  
Williams sat perfectly still for several minutes, the bib pressed between his palms, the tension in the courtroom eased as people became bored with their unresolved suspense. Feet shuffled. Chairs creaked. Someone coughed. Only Munõz sat frozen in place, eyes fixed on the man on the witness stand.  
Gilbert's sweat dried to clamminess in the air-conditioned room, leaching the heat from his skin. He was shivering by the time the first squiggles appeared on the bottom half of the SoulScan monitor. The hair stiffened on his scalp, and he imagined that the entire room was charged with the static of dead souls.  
Williams' body became rigid, his back arched, his belly straining against the straps that held him to the chair. His bony hands constricted on the bib, and he bucked and twisted with epileptic fury.  
'This is a bad one,' Gilbert thought. If a touchstone summoned more than one soul, the conduit needed to fight to stave off the other entities so the desired individual could inhabit him. Untrained Violets had been known to bite their own tongues off during such a fit.  
His head thrashing from side to side, Williams let out a raw, throat-grating scream, and Gilbert saw several of the jurors blanch. No doubt most of them had only seen Violets in movies or on TV cop shows. The real thing was an entirely different experience. Gilbert had probably seen them fifty times or more during his career, and each time seemed worse than the last. Particularly during the past two years.  
Williams' eyes snapped open, and he gaped around the courtroom like a rabbit in a wolves' den. Without changing in any physiological way, the muscles in his face had reconfigured themselves to suggest a new countenance , knitting the brows, thrusting out the chin, inflating the cheeks. He whimpered and tried to wriggle free of the chair's restraints. Then his gaze locked on Hector Munõz, and he fell silent, staring at him.  
Munõz clutched at his temples with trembling hands, unable to look away. "Rosa..."  
Jacobs stepped forward to address the man in the witness stand. "Do you remember me?" He asked him.  
He glanced at him and nodded. No doubt the prosecution had previously summoned the victim in order to question her.  
"Please tell us who you are," Jacobs instructed her.  
"Rosa Munõz." He said the name with a Spanish accent, and the soft tenor of his voice had lifted to a gravelly alto.  
"Let the record show that the witness has identified herself as the victim." Jacobs attempted to reestablish eye contact with him. "Do you know where you are?"  
His eyes remained fixed on Hector Munõz as he shook his head.  
"Do you recognize anyone else in this room?"  
The woman in Matthew Williams' body didn't respond for she was looking down at the bib she held in his hands. "Oh God- Pedrito!"  
"Pedrito... He was your son wasn't he?" Jacobs prompted "Tell us about Pedrito.".  
"'He' killed him. My 'cerdo' of a husband." She thrust his bound hands forward to point at Munõz. "He killed my baby!"  
Munõz slumped over the defense table as though he'd been shot. His lawyer patted him on the shoulder, but offered no words of encouragement.  
Jacobs turned toward the jury. "Let the record show that the witness has identified the defend-"  
"You and your goddanmed 'speed'!" Trembling, the woman in the witness stand glared at Munõz with Williams' fathomless violet eyes, his face wrinkled with contempt. "Always the goddamned speed. And Pedrito crying, getting on your nerves. 'Shut up! Shut up!' " she mimed a shaking motion with his hands. "We'll, you got him to shut up, didn't you, Hector? Didn't you?!"  
Munõz didn't look up.  
"And then what happened?" Jacobs asked.  
"And then I started screaming. Called Hector the 'asesino' he was. The last thing I remember was him grabbing my throat and yelling at me: 'Be quiet, bitch! They'll hear you!' " she pressed the bib to his face and shut his eyes, shuddering. "He follows me everywhere. I'm the only one he knows there, and he never leaves me. Do you know what that's like Hector? Just the two of us, crying in the dark."  
Hector Munõz raised his head, his face streaked with tears. "Oh, God, Rosa, lo siento, lo siento!" Before his attorney could stop him, he clambered over the defense table and bolted toward the witness stand, hands reaching out in supplication to his dead wife. Two guards lunged forward and grabbed him before he got there. "Perdóneme! Perdóneme!" Munõz sobbed as they wrestled him to the floor.  
He knew all along he couldn't win, Gilbert realized. He'd wanted a trial simply because it was his only chance to beg forgiveness of the wife he'd strangled.  
The woman in the witness stand strained forward in the chair, and Gilbert could hear the nylon straps stretch to the point of breaking. "Never," she rasped. Her voice rose to a shriek, and the air vibrated with the force of her hatred. "You hear me, Hector? NEVER!"  
On the SoulScan monitor the smooth, measured waves of Williams' dormant consciousness turned spiky and frenetic. His facial features contorted.  
With a worried look, Burton reached for the panic Button.  
The corners of the Violet's mouth stretched wide to expose gritted teeth, as though he wore a mask that had been pulled too tight. Then his quivering flesh settled into a melancholy composure, and Williams straightened his posture in the chair, breathing deeply.  
Burton withdrew his outstretched hand. Jacobs nodded to him, and the assistant began removing the straps and wires from Williams' body.  
The guards handcuffed and chained Hector Munõz, who moaned inconsolably as they led him out of the room. His attorney, a seasoned public defender appointed by the state, has apparently anticipated such an outcome from the beginning, for she calmly asked for an adjournment to allow her time to revise her client's defense in light of recent developments. Although the prosecution objected to the delay, the judge granted her request. The bailiff helped an exhausted Williams shuffle out the side door.  
As the people around him filed out the courtroom's double doors, Gilbert discovered that his eyes had become dry and sticky from staring so long. His tongue seemed wrapped in gauze and he popped an Altoid into his mouth to try and work up some saliva. Rosa Munõz's final word still reverberated in his head.  
NEVER...  
He dawdled in the courtroom for more than five minutes before he felt ready to meet Matthew Williams.  
'As long as he doesn't touch me...'  
Straightening his tie, Gilbert made his way to the courtroom's side door and showed his ID to the guard standing there. He passed through the door into a private waiting room, where he found Williams stretched out on a sofa, one arm folded over his eyes. His wrists were red from where the plastic bands had rubbed the skin. The knotted tension in his cheeks and brow still bore an afterimage of Rosa Munõz's expression, likes photographic double-exposure.  
"Mr. Williams?"  
Startled, he sat up and regarded him with suspicion.  
"Sorry to bother you." He almost gave him his hand to shake, but put it in his pocket instead. "Special Agent Gilbert Beilschmidt, FBI. Investigative Support Unit. That was ... Quite a performance out there."  
He slumped back on the couch. "If you say so."  
He knelt until he was almost eye level with him. "I know you must be tired, but we really need your help with one of our current cases. When you hear the details, I think you'll agree-"  
"I know the details." His eyes shifted to meet Gilbert's. " 'They' told me."

**cliffhanger? Yes no? Too soon? TELL ME IN A REVIEW GODDAMMIT! quit gaping at your computer like an idiot and tell me your thoughts!**


	3. Chapter 3 Dead Violets

**chapterChapter number three guys! Already! Mattie may be a little OC though, forgive me. **

**3 : Dead Violets : 3**

The hair prickled at the nape of Gilbert's neck. "/they/?"  
He half-closed his eyes. "You know who I mean."  
He chewed on his lower lip. "How many of 'them' have you talked to?"  
"Four. Why? How many are missing?"  
"As of yesterday, seven." Gilbert stood and paced the room, giving himself the excuse to avoid his violet stare. "If we don't act soon, you could be chatting with a bunch more."  
"And if I refuse to help?"  
He pretended to examine the shine on his shoes. "Then I'll have to take you into protective custody. You're a prime target, after all."  
He sighed. "I didn't think I had a choice, but I always like to make sure." He swung his feet off the couch and sat up. "Mind if I change?"  
"Depends on what you change into." Gilbert chuckled, but Williams gave him an icy look. He cleared his throat. "Yeah, do whatever you need to do."  
Matthew unzipped an overnight bag that lay beside what looked like a hatbox on a nearby table. Pulling out a folded outfit, he glanced over his shoulder. "Uh... Could you leave for a minute?"  
"Afraid not. The Bureau wants you under watch twenty-four/seven."  
"You mean they're afraid I might skip out on them."  
He shrugged. "Hey, the killer could be hiding right outside that door."  
"Or even standing here in front of me."  
Gilbert smiled. "Touché, although as 'they' probably told you, the killer never let's his victims see his face."  
"True enough. But if I get killed I'm gong to report you to the Bureau myself. You mind turning around?"  
"Uh... Sure." He faced the wall and folded his arms. "I've read a lot about you," he said with the forced pleasantly of someone speaking to a mental patient.  
"I bet."  
Behind him, cloth whispered against skin. He dredged up more words to keep himself from visualizing him in only underwear. "Nice work on the Aqueduct Killer case."  
"My work is never 'nice', how about yours?"  
Gilbert was glad he couldn't see his grimace. "It has it's ups and downs."  
"You can turn around now."  
He put on the most amiable face he could manage and turned around. Williams now wore a short sleeved white t-shirt and a pair of blue jeans that highlighted his slight but shapely figure. He pulled his black Doc Martin boots back on and tied them, then picked up the discarded long sleeve shirt and slacks and threw them in his bag. Digging in his pocket, he pulled out a small contact lens carrying case.  
"How long have you been working for the Feds?" He asked as he placed a colored lens in each eye.  
"Five years. Before that I was a detective here in L.A."  
"You must be a glutton for punishment." Pulling a roll of double-sided tape out of the overnight bag, he tore off strips of the sticky plastic and applied them in an arc across his scalp an down to his temples. He then opened the hatbox and took out a shoulder length wavy blonde wig, which he carefully arranged on his head. "So where do we go from here?"  
"The LAPD admin building- we've set up a meeting there for your convenience. We can take my car to avoid the press."  
"Nah, lets walk." Examining his reflection in the mirror, Williams pressed the wig more into place and combed out its tangles with his fingers. "They won't recognize me."  
The change in his appearance was startling. The long hair hid the skeletal starkness of his tattooed scalp and softened the planes of his cheeks and chin, while the contacts lighted his eyes from dark purple to crystal blue. Not a trace of Rosa Munõz remained.  
"Anyone ever tell you you look good as a blonde?" He asked with a tentative grin. It wasn't simply a lame ice-breaker line, either, he meant it. If he weren't a Violet...  
Williams' face may have changed, but his expression didn't; it remained resentful, resigned, and a trifle sad. "Here. Make yourself useful." He held out the overnight case and wig box. "Let's go out the back."  
Gilbert remained quietly courteous, but took great care to make sure their fingers didn't brush when he handed him the luggage. He knew that Violets could use people as touchstones, and unlike Hector Munõz, Gilbert had no desire to speak to ghosts from his past.  
'it's only for a few days- a week or two at most,' he reminded himself. 'As long as he doesn't touch me...'

They left the courthouse through the restricted access portion of the building, the pathways reserved exclusively for judges, police officers, and prisoners. If they'd use the elevator, they would have been on the ground in less than five minutes, but Williams insisted they take the stairs.  
Gilbert raised an eyebrow. "Claustrophobic?"  
"It's good exercise." Was all he said as they entered the emergency stairwell at the ninth floor.  
"Easy for you to say, you're not the one carrying the suitcase."  
Reporters and shutterbugs still loitered outside the courthouse, no doubt hoping to snap pictures of the Violet in all his bald-headed, purple-eyed strangeness. But no one spared a glance at Williams when he and Gilbert emerged from the building and strolled down Temple to Los Angeles Street. It was almost as if Matthew was invisible.  
A security checkpoint at the corner allowed only authorized vehicles to enter, but the street was open to foot traffic, and they proceeded halfway down the block toward a cement glacier propped up by cylindrical concrete columns- the monolithic entrance of Parker Center, the LAPD's administration building. After walking through the blast-furnace heat outside, Gilbert savored the refreshing chill as they passed beneath the glacier and into the air-conditioned police headquarters.  
He led Williams up to the second floor and rapped on the door of a small conference room. A broad man with mocha-colored skin and short brown hair let them in. The knot of his tie hung loose below the unbuttoned collar of a white dress shirt that had been pressed with military precision. "About time! I was beginning to wonder if we'd have to add you two to the victims list."  
"Allow me to introduce my boss, Sadiq Adnan," Gilbert said to Williams as Sadiq stepped aside for them to enter. "He's the Special Agent in Command for this case. Sadiq- Matthew Williams."  
SAC Sadiq Adnan extended a hand, which Matthew shook without enthusiasm. Gilbert winced. In that brief moment of contact, he wondered, did he get a glimmer of the dead people in Sadiq's past? Did it bother Sadiq to think that he might?  
Setting Williams' overnight bag and wig box by the door, Gilbert gestured toward a dark-haired man in a beige suit who sat at a long table that was covered with open file folders, photographs, and miscellaneous items of evidence. "And this is Wang Yao, detective from the LAPD's East Los Angeles Division."  
Yao stood and offered his hand to Matthew, Yao never seemed to smile and he conducted himself with overzealous professionalism of one who has had to fight to be respected by his peers.  
"Detective Yao's in charge of the local investigation," Gilbert explained. "Matthew- can I call you Matthew?- Matthew says he's been in contact with some of the victims."  
Yao and Sadiq exchanged a glance.  
"That's interesting." Sadiq picked a three-by-four inch snapshot off the table and handed it to Williams. "Heard anything from him?"  
For the first time since the trial, Matthew's stony expression faltered: eyes glistening, mouth trembling. Peering over his shoulder, Gilbert saw that the photo depicted a little boy with blonde hair and violet eyes. His broad, goofy grin was missing two upper teeth on the left side, and he held a butterscotch tabby cat that was almost as big as he was. Gilbert recognized the snapshot from the briefing Yao had given him that morning.  
"Williams passed the photo back to Sadiq. "No, he hasn't knocked. Is he..."  
"We were hoping you could tell us. He disappeared yesterday. We haven't found a body yet, if that means anything. Of course, we haven't found any of the others, either." Sadiq tossed the photo beside the open file folders. "He moves the bodies after they're dead, so even the victims can't tell us where they are."  
"Who was he?" Matthew's use of the past tense made Gilbert wince.  
"Peter Kirkland." Sadiq replied. "The babysitter who was supposed to be watching him was asleep in the house when she heard Peter shouting in the backyard. By the time she got outside, Peter was gone. The babysitter saw someone in dark clothing climb over the backyard fence and run away. From the size and posture of the figure, she's pretty sure it was a man." The detective frowned. "He had a bulging plastic garbage bag slung over his shoulder."  
"You come up with anything a the crime scene?" Gilbert asked.  
"No prints or fibers- the guy worked clean. About all we got was this." The detective held up the plaster cast of a shoe sole. "Reeboks, size ten and a half. Brand new, by the look of it. Found the tracks on some of the dusty patches in the back lawn."  
"Great. That narrows the field to a few million suspects. What about the killer's car?"  
Yao set aside the shoe imprint and shook his head. "We figure he parked here, in the alley that runs behind the back fence of the Kirkland residence." He tapped his finger on a schematic diagram of the crime scene and its environs. "We've canvased the neighborhood, but no one remembers seeing a car drive in or out of that alley- most of the people in that area are away at work during the day. About the only good news is that we didn't find any traces of the boy's blood, for whatever that's worth."  
"Why wasn't he at the School?"  
Matthew's question took Gilbert and the others by surprise. "Funny you should ask," Sadiq said. "His mother pulled him out of the School last week, before we even considered the children possible targets for the killer. Ms. Kirkland's now convinced that /we/ took her son. The older brother is just as convinced."  
"Did you?" Matthew had restored his frigid calm, and Gilbert fancied that he could see his violet irises radiating through blue shells of his contacts.  
Sadiq glared at him. "We had nothing to do with this."  
"No doubt the Corps has all the other kids in custody now."  
"For their own safety." The SAC responded in an arch tone.  
"Gilbert moved to break the tension between the two of them. "Why don't you tell us which of these have contacted you?"  
He indicated the open file folders, and Yao pushed them forward for Matthew's inspection. A photo of each missing Violet had been paper-clipped inside each folder, along with a background sheet containing personal data, family information, and a North American Afterlife Communications Corps registration number. The flat, institutional Polaroids all resembled criminal mugshots, each one featuring a man or woman with a bald head and violet eyes.  
Without bothering to look at the typewritten name on the data sheet beside it, Williams pointed to the photo of a short man with pudgy cheeks. "Tino's knocked." His finger moved to a picture of a young woman with a smile and large breasts. "And Katyusha... Kat." He'd been close to her... Then a mid-sized man with a scruffy neck and and an almost intimidating expression. "Francis." Next a copper-skinned Taiwanese woman. "Mei."  
Matthew stopped abruptly, his fingertips lingering on the face of a young man with a semi-large nose and a small smile. "Ivan..."  
"Heard from him too?" Gilbert asked.  
"No. And I should have." He looked up at him with indignant suspicion. "How do you know he's dead?"  
"Francis Bonnefoy summoned him. We have the deposition on video, if you want to see it."  
Laying his palms flat on the table, he braced himself to remain upright, and Gilbert pulled a chair out for him. He sank into it.  
"I'm sorry you had to find out this way," he said. "You were friends?"  
"You could say that." He stared at Ivan's photo. "They were all my friends. All but... What was his name? Peter?"  
"Yes. It was your familiarity with the other victims that made us select you for this investigation, Mr. Williams," Sadiq said. "That, and your... Expertise in dealing with violent crime." He pushed another folder forward. "Was she a friend of yours too?"  
"Not exactly." The frown lines at the sides of Matthew's mouth deepened as he examined the photo of a fair-skinned young woman with a small, angular face. The woman's head was turned away slightly and her eyes downcast, as though the government photographer had caught her by surprise. "I knew Natalia, but she hasn't come to me, either. Last I heard, she and Ivan were together."  
Gilbert detected the acid aftertaste of jealously in his tone. Had Matthew and Ivan Braginsiki been an item once? Matthew was listed in his file as a homosexual, and Ivan as a bisexual, so it was probable. Gilbert had worked with Ivan on the Philly Ripper case last year, and found the Violet to be a sullen, standoffish sort.  
'they'd make a perfect couple,' Gilbert thought. He was strangely disappointed in Williams though, for choosing such a misanthrope as a boyfriend.  
"When did Tino and the others start 'knocking', as you put it?" Sadiq asked him.  
"End of August. Tino was the first. He was trying to warn as many of us as he could." He gave Sadiq a cold look. "He knew the Corps wouldn't."  
The SAC's mouth twisted, but he didn't contradict him.  
Gilbert glanced from one to the other in alarm. He'd heard nasty things about the NACC, but nothing like this. "The Corps didn't alert their membership?"  
"Of course not," Matthew said. "They didn't want us to panic and run. Isn't that right, Mr. Adnan?"  
The SAC answered without meeting Gilbert's questioning gaze. "Corps Security wanted the opportunity to contain the problem before it got out of hand."  
"But it /did/ get out of hand, didn't it?" Matthew pressed. "When Tino warned her, Mei tried to hide, but the Corps dragged her back..."  
Turning his back on him, Sadiq raised his voice and pointed to a U.S. map that had been thumbtacked to a bulletin board on the wall. "Tino disappeared in D.C. On August twenty-eighth, Katyusha two days later in Baltimore. Conduits have a history of taking unscheduled vacations, so we figured they'd turn up eventually."  
"When Corps Security tracked them down," Williams added.  
The SAC calmed himself before continuing. "Natalia and Ivan were working for us at Quantico, and both reported that Tino and Katyusha had come to them and told them they'd been killed by a man wearing a black mask. Within a week, Natalia vanished, followed by Ivan a day later. That's when we knew our killer had a thing for Violets.  
"The N-double-A-C-C turns the case over to us, and we called in Francis Bonnefoy to summon all the previous victims for their testimony. Because of the geographic clustering of the initial victims, we thought the UNSUB might be a Maryland or Virginia local," Sadiq explained, using the acronym that designated the "unknown subject" of the investigation. "The Corps took steps to protect the members in the immediate area. Then the killer got Francis in New York on September tenth, and Mei in Miami on the twelfth. Both were taken in their sleep, so they couldn't tell us anything about the UNSUB. Now he's come to the West Coast for Peter Kirkland, and we have no idea who's next." He paused for effect, leaning toward Matthew. "Maybe you."  
Gilbert noted the pulse in his neck. "You've done an admirable job of keeping it out of the papers."  
Sadiq snorted. "So far, yes. But it's only a matter of time before someone connects the disappearances- or a body turns up. That's why we need to catch this nutcase now."  
"All right, then. What do you want from me."  
"We'll as you can see, we can't even find a corpse to examine." The SAC indicated the avalanche of data spread over the table. "In the past, murderers who've worn masks or disguised their appearance have always left us something to work with- trace forensic evidence, a motive buried in the victim's memories, even the body language the killer displayed while commuting the crime. In tho case, the killer hasn't left so much as a hair at the crime scene, and none of the victims has a clue who he is or why he kills."  
"What makes you think I'll be able to find out any more about him than the other Violets?"  
"We need to talk to the boy," Gilbert suggested "Peter. He doesn't seem to fit the pattern of the other victims. He was only a kid, not a full Corps member. Maybe he can tell us something about why the killer chooses the Violets he does."  
Matthew sighed. "I'll need a touchstone."  
Yao selected an evidence bag from the scattered items on the table and held it up. A plastic toy boat sat in the plastic. "would this work?"  
In spite of his carefully applied disguise, dark shadows of weariness reappeared around Matthew's eyes. "Yes, that will do."  
He made no move to take the boat.  
"We've had a room specially prepared for you." Sadiq jerked his head in the direction of the exit. "Detective would you...?"  
"Sure." With the bagged toy in his hand, Yao crossed the room and pulled open the door. "Mr. Williams?"  
The Violet collected his luggage and stalked out with Yao beside him. Gilbert was about to join them when Sadiq laid a hand on his shoulder.  
"Wait." He looked like a father whose son had failed his final exam. "Where's your gun?"  
Gilbert shoved his hands in his pockets. "I have it. It's in the trunk of my car."  
"Wrong answer, Agent Beilschmidt." Sadiq's expression softened. "Look, I know what you're going through, but you can't let it get in the way. Remember: you're not only his partner- you're Williams' last line of defense."  
Gilbert shook his head. "And I thought this was gonna be a desk job," he mourned with a thin chuckle, and left the room.

**If you have any questions comments or concerns about the story or the character feel free to review and/or PM me!**


	4. Chapter 4 Peter

**4 : Peter : 4**

Gilbert got to the interrogation room just as Yao finished strapping Matthew into his chair. When the detective started to untangle the electrode wires of a nearby SouScan unit, however, the Violet balked.  
"That won't be necessary." He said.  
Yao looked to Gilbert for guidance. "You sure about that?" Gilbert asked Williams.  
He brushed a hand through the strands of his wig. "I just got it on..."  
"We won't have access to the Panic Button."  
"I can handle it. And I really don't enjoy electric shocks."  
"Your call." He waved Yao off, and the detective wound the electrode wires back into a neat bundle. From a nearby corner of the room, he took a camcorder on a tripod and moved it in front of Matthew, but Gilbert told him to put it back.  
Yao didn't budge. "Regulations require that all conduit depositions be videotaped."  
Gilbert waited for Williams to object as well; when he didn't, he edged closer to Yao and lowered his voice. "Detective, we're about to yank a little boy out of the blackness of death and ask him intimate details about how he was murdered. He'll be frightened enough without having a camera lens shoves in his face. Don't you agree?"  
The detective's officious demeanor faltered, and he withdrew the camera.  
Matthew gave Gilbert a slight nod.  
He place two folding chairs in front of the Violet while Yao handed him the evidence bag containing Peter Kirkland's boat. Matthew ran his fingertips over the side of the boat, but seemed reluctant to remove it from the bag.  
"Want me to take it out for you?" Yao offered.  
"No, I can do it." Uttering a rapid, repetitive whisper, Matthew tore open the plastic.  
With spastic suddenness, his hand tightened around the sides of the boat, his forearm becoming a bas-relief of taut tendons and veins. A kaleidoscope of shadows shifted across his face as the musculature of his cheeks and brow ripple and reshaped.  
Gilbert thought of the little boy with the blonde hair and missing baby teeth and felt a queasy sense of dread bubble up from his gut. He braced himself against the back of a chair and realized he hadn't taken a breath for almost a minute.  
Yao gave him a sympathetic look. "First time?"  
"Yes and no." He licked his dry lips. "Every time seems like the first. I'll be back in a sec."  
He stepped out of the room and tugged the knot of his tie away from his Adam's apple. The soundproofed door closed behind him, cutting off the plaintive wail of a child that bawled with Matthew's voice. Gilbert sighed and ambled down the corridor to an alcove on the tight where vending machines dispensed bottled soft drinks and packaged snacks. The blood returned to his face in a blush. He was acting like a total rookie.  
He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hands, then fished a dollar out of his wallet and fed it into one of the machines. It spat out a Kit Kat bar along with his change. He grabbed the coins and candy and returned to the interrogation room, pausing outside the door in order to put on his game face.  
"It's okay, it's okay," Yao repeated in a soft tone as Gilbert entered. "We're not going to hurt you..."  
Matthew hunched in his chair, the long locks of the wig hanging down over his face as though he were trying to hide behind the curtains of blonde hair. He chewed on the thumb of his left hand while clutching the boat to his chest with his right.  
Maintaining eye contact with him, Yao introduced the two of them. "Peter, I'm Yao, and this is my friend Gilbert. We were hoping you could help us."  
Matthew looked up at Gilbert with large, liquid eyes. It reminded him of the way his niece met strangers for the first time. 'What a thing for a kid to go through...' He thought, but smiled reassuringly as he seated himself on the chair beside Yao's. "Hey, Peter. It's nice to finally meet you. Here, I brought you something..." He held up the Kit Kat. "You like chocolate?"  
He nodded.  
Gilbert unwrapped the bar and broke off one of the chocolate-coated cookie sticks for him. "Want some?"  
He looked at the candy he offered, but made no move to take it. His eyes scoured the room. "Where's mom? Is she here?"  
Gilbert swallowed to relieve the tightness in his throat. "No honey. But she wanted us to tell you that she loves you and thinks about you all the time."  
"Oh." Disappointment. Since his mother was not waiting to give him a hug, he took the thumb from his mouth and pointed to the chocolate stick. "I can have it?"  
"Sure."  
He took the stick from him, stuck it in his mouth, and started to lick the coating off the soggy wafers. Saliva dripped down onto his fingers, and his mouth became smeared with melted chocolate. The boat he still held close to his heart.  
"Peter?" Yao leaned forward. "Can you tell us the last thing you remember? The last thing you saw... Before..."  
"Before I died?" He stared at the detective with the hard, grim gaze of a Violet, reminding Gilbert that this little boy had been denied the comforting ignorance of mortality enjoyed by most children. He had known death every day of his brief life.  
"Yes, Peter." Gilbert said. "Can you tell us how you died?"  
He shook his head.  
"Why not? We're you asleep?"  
"Sort of." He bit off some of the bare wafer and chewed it. "Someone was inside me."  
"Someone was inside you? Someone dead?" Yao took a ballpoint pen and a small notepad from his jacket pocket. "Who was that?"  
"Tino. He used to be one of my teachers." He finished the chocolate stick and licked his fingers. "He was the one who told me about the man with no face."  
He pointed sheepishly to the rest of the candy bar in Gilbert's hand. He broke off another stick for him. "Did you see the man with no face?"  
He nodded and pulled his elbows close to his sides as if cowering in a cold draft. "He came, just like Tino said he would."  
"What do you mean when you say he didn't have a face?"  
"It was just, like, a black lump. No eyes or nose or mouth or nothing."  
"A mask." Yao commented. "Same MO as the others."  
"When did you first see the Faceless Man?"  
"When he jumped out at me. I got scared and tried to run away."  
"Then what happened?"  
"Tino came in. He wanted to help, but he was too late."  
"That's all you remember?"  
"That. And being dead." His gaze lost its focus, and the chocolate stick wilted in his hand, forgotten.  
Gilbert touched his forearm. "Peter? Peter? Why did your mom take you out of the School?"  
"Because that's where Tino said he'd be." His voice was distant, small, and sad. "The man with no face."  
"Tino told you about him while you were still at the School? Did you ever see the man while you were there?"  
He considered the question, an his mouth opened. Then he shook his head.  
Yao scribbled something in his notebook. "Can you tell us anything else about the Faceless Man? Do you know why he'd want to hurt you?"  
"Uh-uh."  
"How about Tino?" Gilbert asked. "Did /he/ know why the man was coming to get you?"  
"He thinks the man hates us."  
"Us?"  
"The special ones. The dead-talkers. That's why Tino was trying to warn us. He said he'd visit me as much as he could to make sure I was okay."  
"Did anyone besides Tino visit you at the School?"  
"Not me. But some others came to my friends there."  
"And they said the same thing? About the Faceless Man?"  
He nodded.  
"What did the teachers at the School do when you told them what Tino said?"  
"They said he was just trying to scare us and that everything would be okay."  
'That's the Corps for you.' Gilbert thought. 'They obviously wanted time to "contain the problem" before the parents started yanking their kids out of the School.' "Is that when you asked your mommy to take you home?"  
"Uh-huh."  
"I see." Gilbert silently pitied Ms. Kirkland. By saving her son from the government, she exposed him to the killer. "Thank you for helping us, Peter." He looked at Yao. "You have anything else?"  
The detective scanned his notes. "Not at the moment."  
"Mister?"  
Gilbert glanced back to find Matthew peering at him intently. "Yes, Peter?"  
"Please don't let him hurt my friends."  
It took Gilbert a moment to find his voice. "We won't," he said at last, and he hoped he could keep the vow.  
With the questioning complete, an awkward silence descended on the interrogation room. Gilbert tried not to stare at the grown man in front of him as he hugged his boat and ate his chocolate stick. Was Matthew aware that they were done? Gilbert knew that experienced Violets could monitor the thoughts of the souls that inhabited them. How long did he need to reassert control? Perhaps, if the spirit left willingly...  
He leaned forward to make eye contact with him again. "Peter? We need to talk to Matthew now..."  
He pouted defiantly. "I don't want to go back."  
Pinpricks of panic danced across Gilbert's scalp, but he kept his voice level and calm as he chided him. "Peter, you can't stay."  
"I miss mommy. I miss my friends. I miss my kitty. I miss them all so much!" He started to cry, drool spilling over his lower lip with each hiccuping sob.  
Yao glanced toward the unused SoulScan unit and gave Gilbert a questioning look, but Gilbert signals him to wait. He got out of his chair and knelt in front of Williams. "What's your cat's name, Peter?"  
He sniffled and gulped the spit in his mouth. "General."  
"Tell you what: I'll get General a big can of tuna and tell him it came from you."  
His shuddering breaths began to quiet. "What about mommy?"  
"I'll tell her that you love her and miss her a lot."  
He chewed on his thumb and pressed the boat closer. "can I have the rest of my candy before I go?"  
"Sure, honey."  
He gave him the rest of the kKit Kat bar, and he made sorrowful little mewling sounds while he finished it. As he licked the chocolate residue from his fingers, shadows settled into the hollows of his eyes, aging his expression into one of adult exhaustion. Matthew wipe the saline trail of a tear from his face, and ended up smearing his cheek with brown stickiness. His grief tainted with embarrassment, he looked at his chocolate-slicked hand in helpless annoyance. "Can somebody get me a napkin?"  
"Here." Gilbert took a folded handkerchief from his back pocket and shook it out for him. "We'll let you clean up in the bathroom before the debriefing."  
He signaled Yao, who undid Matthews' restraints. He handed the boat to Gilbert and Yao led him down the hall to the men's lavatory.  
Williams had recovered his composure by the time they returned to the interrogation room. Gilbert noticed, though, that he seated himself in what had been /his/ chair, leaving him the chair with the dangling nylon straps. He chose to remain standing instead.  
Yao poised his pen over a blank page of his notepad. "What can you give us?"  
"Not much." Matthew responded. "Perp definitely seemed to be a man. Slender but well built, weight between one-seventy and one-ninety. Height is a little more difficult to guess; Peter's perspective Is a lot lower than mine, and he was hunched over when he saw him. Could have been anywhere from five ten to six three. Wore a black veil, dark clothes, latex gloves."  
"Did he say anything?"  
"No, not to Peter. His sensory memories ended as soon as Tino took over though."  
"At least Tino spared him the physical pain. What about the School?" Yao flipped back a few pages. "When I asked Peter If he'd seen the Faceless man there, he seemed unsure of himself."  
"There /was/ something- the memory of a man sitting on his haunches in front of a large metal tank."  
"Did you recognize the location?" Gilbert asked.  
"No." Matthew shut his eyes, as though to recapture the image. "The man wore some kind of uniform, like a jumpsuit, and he had a toolbox with him. He wasn't wearing a mask though."  
"He wasn't? What did he look like?"  
"Give me that sketchbook and I'll show you." He indicated the table by the door, where a drawing pad and pencils had been provided for use by police sketch artists.  
Gilbert brought him the drawing materials and watched in fascination as he deftly rendered a picture of the stranger Peter had seen at the School: a Caucasian man with curly blonde hair, full cheeks and lips, and a bushy mustache and eyebrows. /Blue eyes/, Matthew scrawled at the top of the black-and-white drawing.  
"This is the best I can do." He tore the finished sketch off the pad and gave it to Yao. "Peter didn't get too good a look at his face; as soon as he saw him standing behind him, he stood up and hurried away."  
Yao frowned at the portrait. "So why does he think this guy was the Faceless Man?"  
"Obviously he didn't." Gilbert said. "That's why he didn't mention him."  
"He saw a resemblance though."  
Yao glanced at Matthew. "what do you mean?"  
"It was something about the body language." His hands groped the air as he strained to define the impression. "In both cases, Peter sensed some... /hesitation/ in the man. More than that: reluctance- dread, even."  
"Doesn't sound like your typical psycho." The detective angled the drawing toward Gilbert. "Should I circulate this?"  
"Hold off for now- a kid's hunch by itself isn't enough to link this guy to the killer." He turned to Matthew. "How would you feel about a visit to your old alma mater?"  
"Can I get a root canal instead?"  
"Great! We'll leave first thing in the morning."  
"Where are we staying /tonight/?"  
"My hotel room." He raise his hands to calm him. "It has two beds."  
"Joy. Can I at least stop by my apartment and get a few things?"  
"Of course."  
"Good." Matthew picked up his bag and thrust his wig box at Gilbert. "Dinner's on you."  
"Fair enough." He accepted the luggage without complaint, then took a business card from his wallet and handed it to Yao. "Thanks for your help, detective. Call my cell phone if you get any news."  
"Sure." He tucked the card into his jacket pocket along with his notepad. "Where you going now?"  
"To give Ms. Kirkland some bad news."

**Alright guys. Four chapters and only two reviews... Hmm... Something doesn't add up. No new chaps Til I reach a total of... TEN REVIEWS!**


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